Fox resurrects crueler than usual reality series

Reality TV thrives off of highlighting how ridiculous, conniving or cruel humans can actually be.

But Fox is resurrecting a crueler than usual reality series, in which employees of struggling companies decide which one of their coworkers gets fired, Deadline reports.

One episode of “Someone’s Gotta Go” was filmed at the height of the economic downturn in 2009, before Fox abandoned the project. The premise of the series was originally based around budget-constrained companies that had to layoff employees, but people protested against the series saying it was insensitive when so many people were losing their jobs.

Now that the economy is just barely picking back up, the network has ordered four episodes of the newly minted “Does Someone Have to Go?”, which it will pitch as “‘Survivor’ meets ‘The Office.'” The revived series will instead focus on “dysfunctional” companies — and in another twist, employees will be able to choose not to fire someone at the end.

So if you’ve always dreamed of getting rid of the Dwight or Milton in your office, this reality series is for you. But instead of not getting a red rose or a check for $1 million or record deal, you’re voting to send someone’s livelihood down the drain. No biggie.

UPDATE: The original version of this story stated that Fox aired one episode of “Someone’s Gotta Go” before abandoning the project in 2009. The network filmed one episode of the reality series, which never aired. The Daily Caller regrets the error.